Why Centralise Email Functionality

I am tasked with recommending or developing a system that will centralise outbound email within a company. This means some system that ties together transactional emails and marketing emails.

From a development point of view having both types of email served from the same system makes complete sense. Does it make sense from a business point of view though? I have to say, yes. I think it does. Here is why.

There is one system for new staff to learn

New marketers have one place to update templates, copy and their testing parameters.

New developers have one API to learn.

People who document best practice for their company don’t need to worry about duplicating work for best practice on system x and system y.

There is one place to edit crucial information

Company numbers, VAT numbers, or anything you need to include on outbound emails change then having one system to update is easier. Especially if that system lets you create templates that include standard sections.

Reduced Costs

As you grow and your email needs increase, you don’t need to pay many suppliers as you scale. It also gives you more buying power if you were looking to switch suppliers, because you can explain how many emails you send total.

Data doesn’t get lost

Unsubscribes don’t get ignored during imports between systems, attributes added to customers can take immediate effect.

If you segment your user base (you should) then these segments will be available for all email campaigns and you don’t need to replicate the logic in a different place.

Data protection is less of an issue

The more places you have data for people, the more places you need to make sure are protecting that data and that the data is up to date.

The more services you use the bigger the attack vector against your users is.

There is less cognitive overhead

When adding a new feature you don’t have to think about the multitude of different services you may need to use or tell about this new feature.

On a landing page when someone has given you their email and opted in for marketing you don’t want to think about all the places email needs to go. You need take effort to keep this updated going forward and for any new landing pages.

A more unified experience for your customers

If there are many places to store email templates, one will get neglected, this means different logos and footers. Which weakens your brand versus if all emails send a strong brand message along with the content you are delivering.